Jurassic Park / Парк Юрского периода

“No,” Grant said. “This is not a lizard. No three-toed lizard has walked on this planet for two hundred million years.”

Ellie’s first thought was that she was looking at a hoax – a skillful hoax, but a hoax nonetheless.

“Could this X-ray be faked?”

“I don’t know,” Grant said. “But it’s almost impossible to fake an X-ray. And Procompsognathus[10] is an obscure animal. Even people familiar with dinosaurs have never heard of it.”

Ellie read the note. “Specimen acquired on the beach of Cabo Blanco, July 16. Apparently a howler monkey was eating the animal, and this was all that was recovered. Oh, and it says the lizard attacked a little girl.”

“I doubt that,” Grant said. “But perhaps. Procompsognathus was so small and light we assume it must be a scavenger, only feeding off dead creatures. And you can tell the size” – he measured quickly – “it’s about twenty centimeters to the hips, which means the full animal would be about a foot tall. About as big as a chicken. Even a child would look pretty fearsome to it. It might bite an infant, but not a child.”

Ellie frowned at the X-ray image. “You think this could really be a legitimate rediscovery?” she said. “Like the coelacanth[11]?”

“Maybe,” Grant said. The coelacanth was a five-foot- long fish thought to have died out sixty-five million years ago, until a specimen was pulled from the ocean in 1938. But there were other examples.

“But could it be real?” she persisted. “What about the age?”

Grant nodded. “The age is a problem.”

Most rediscovered animals were rather recent additions to the fossil record: ten or twenty thousand years old. But the specimen they were looking at was much, much older than that. Dinosaurs had died out sixty-five million years ago. They had flourished as the dominant life form on the planet in the Jurassic, 190 million years ago. And they had first appeared in the Triassic, roughly 220 million years ago.

“Well,” Ellie said. “We know animals have survived. Crocodiles are basically Triassic animals living in the present. Sharks are Triassic. So we know it has happened before.”

Grant nodded. “And the thing is,” he said, “how else do we explain it? It’s either a fake – which I doubt – or else it’s a rediscovery. What else could it be?”

The phone rang. “Alice Levin again,” Grant said. “Let’s see if she’ll send us the actual specimen.” He answered it and looked at Ellie, surprised. “Yes, I’ll hold for Mr. Hammond.”

“Hammond? What does he want?” Ellie said.

Grant shook his head, and then said into the phone, “Yes, Mr. Hammond. Yes, it’s good to hear your voice, too.” He looked at Ellie. “Oh, you did? Oh yes? Is that right?”

Grant pushed the speaker button, and Ellie heard a raspy old-man’s voice speaking rapidly: hell of an annoyance from some EPA fellow. I don’t suppose anybody came to see you way out there?”

“As a matter of fact,” Grant said, “somebody did come to see me.”

Hammond snorted. “I was afraid of that. Did he bother you? Disrupt your work?”

“No, no, he didn’t bother me.”

“Well, you know we have an island down at Costa Rica?”

“No,” Grant said, looking at Ellie, “I didn’t know.”

“Oh yes, we bought it and started our operation, oh, four or five years ago now. Called Isla Nublar – big island, hundred miles offshore. Going to be a biological preserve. Wonderful place. Tropical jungle. You know, you ought to see it, Dr. Grant.”

“Sounds interesting,” Grant said, “but actually – ”

“It’s almost finished now, you know,” Hammond said. “You really ought to go see it. As a matter of fact, I’m going to insist you see it, Dr. Grant. You’d find it fascinating.”

“I’m in the middle of Grant said.

“Say, I’ll tell you what,” Hammond said, “I’m having some of the people who consulted for us go down there this weekend. Spend a few days and look it over. At our expense, of course. It’d be terrific if you’d give us your opinion.”

“I couldn’t possibly,” Grant said.

“Oh, just for a weekend,” Hammond said, “That’s all I’m talking about, Dr. Grant. I wouldn’t want to interrupt your work. But you could hop on down there this weekend, and be back on Monday.”

“No, I couldn’t,” Grant said. “I’ve just found a new skeleton and we’ve just received some evidence for a very puzzling find, a living procompsognathus.”

“A what?” Hammond said, slowing down. “I didn’t quite get that. You said a living procompsognathus?”

“That’s right,” Grant said. “It’s a biological specimen, a fragment of a living animal from a beach called Cabo Blanco.”

“You don’t say,” Hammond said. “A living animal? How extraordinary.”

“Yes,” Grant said. “We think so, too. So, you see, this isn’t the time for me to go anywhere.”

“I see.” Hammond cleared his throat, “And when did this, ah, specimen arrive in your hands?”

“Just today.”

On the speaker, Hammond coughed. “Ah, Dr. Grant. Have you told anybody about it yet?”

“No.”

“Good, that’s good. Well. Yes. I’ll tell you frankly, Dr. Grant, I’m having a little problem about this island. This EPA thing is coming at just the wrong time.”

“How’s that?” Grant said.

“Well, we’ve had our problems and some delays… Let’s just say that I’m under a little pressure here, and I’d like you to look at this island for me. I’ll be paying you the usual weekend consultant rate of twenty thousand a day. That’d be sixty thousand for three days. And if you can spare Dr. Sattler, she’ll go at the same rate. We need a botanist. What do you say?”

Ellie looked at Grant as he said, “Well, Mr. Hammond, that much money would fully finance our expeditions for the next two summers.”

“Good, good,” Hammond said politely. “Now, I’m sending the corporate jet to pick you up at that private airfield east of Choteau. It’s only about two hours’ drive from where you are. You be there at five p.m. tomorrow. Can you and Dr. Sattler make that plane?”

“I guess we can.”

“Good. Pack lightly. You don’t need passports. I’m looking forward to it. See you tomorrow,” Hammond said, and he hung up.

Cowan, Swain and Ross

In the San Francisco law firm of Cowan, Swain and Ross Donald Gennaro listened on the phone and looked at his boss, Daniel Ross.

“I understand, John,” Gennaro said. “And Grant agreed to come? Good, that sounds fine to me. My congratulations, John.” He hung up the phone and turned to Ross.

“We can’t trust Hammond any more. He’s under too much pressure. The EPA’s investigating him, he’s behind schedule on his Costa Rican resort, and the investors are getting nervous. There have been too many rumors of problems down there. Too many workmen have died. And now this business about a living procompsit – whatever on the mainland…”

“What does that mean?” Ross said.

“Maybe nothing,” Gennaro said. “But we’ve got to inspect that island right away.”

“And what does Hammond say?”

“He insists nothing is wrong on the island. Claims he has all these security precautions.”

“But you don’t believe him,” Ross said.

“No,” Gennaro said. “I don’t.”

Donald Gennaro had come to Cowan, Swain and Ross as a specialist in investment banking. One of his first assignments, back in 1982, had been to accompany John Hammond while the old man, then nearly seventy, put together the funding to start the InGen corporation. They eventually raised almost a billion dollars.

“Hammond’s a dreamer,” Gennaro said.

“A potentially dangerous dreamer,” Ross said. “In any case, I agree that an inspection is overdue. What about your site experts?”

“I’m starting with experts Hammond already hired as consultants, early in the project.” Gennaro tossed a list onto Ross’s desk. “First group is a paleontologist, a paleobotanist, and a mathematician. They go down this weekend. I’ll go with them.”

“Will they tell you the truth?” Ross said.

“I think so. None of them had much to do with the island, and one of them – the mathematician, Ian Malcolm – was openly hostile to the project from the start. Insisted it would never work, could never work.”

“And who else?”

“Just a technical person: the computer system analyst. Review the park’s computers and fix some bugs. He should be there by Friday morning.”

“Fine,” Ross said. “You’re making the arrangements?”

“Hammond asked to place the calls himself. I think he wants to pretend that he’s not in trouble, that it’s just a social invitation. Showing off his island.”

“All right,” Ross said. “But just make sure it happens. Stay on top of it. I want this Costa Rican situation resolved within a week.” Ross got up, and walked out of the room.

Plans

“This just came,” Ellie said the next day, walking to the back of the trailer with a thick manila envelope. “It’s from Hammond.”

Grant noticed the blue-and-white InGen logo as he tore open the envelope. Inside was a thick book. As he flipped open the book, a sheet of paper fell out.

Dear Alan and Ellie,

As you can imagine we don't have much in the way offormal promotional materials yet. But this should give you some idea of the Isla Nublar project. I think it's very exciting!

Looking forward to discussing this with you! Hope you can join us!

Regards, John

“I don’t get it,” Grant said. He flipped through the sheets. “These are architectural plans.” He turned to the top sheet:

VISITOR CENTER/LODGE

ISLA NUBLAR RESORT

The next page was a topographical map. It showed Isla Nublar as an inverted teardrop, bulging at the north, tapering at the south. The island was eight miles long, and the map divided it into several large sections.

The northern section was marked VISITOR AREA and it contained structures marked “Visitor Arrivals”, “Visitor Center/Administration”, “Power/Desalinization/Support”, “Hammond Res.”, and “Safari Lodge”. Grant could see the outline of a swimming pool, the rectangles of tennis courts, and the round signs that represented planting and shrubbery.

“Looks like a resort, all right,” Ellie said.

There followed detail sheets for the Safari Lodge itself: a long low building with a series of pyramid shapes on the roof. But there was little about the other buildings in the visitor area.

And the rest of the island was even more mysterious. As far as Grant could tell, it was mostly open space. A network of roads, tunnels, and outlying buildings, and a long thin lake, with concrete dams and barriers. But, for the most part, the island was divided into big curving areas with very little development at all. Each area was marked by codes.

“Is there an explanation for the codes?” she said.

Grant flipped the pages rapidly, but he couldn’t find one. He looked at the big curving divisions, separated from one another by the network of roads. There were only six divisions on the whole island. And each division was separated from the road by a concrete moat. Outside each moat was a fence with a little lightning sign alongside it. That mystified them until they were finally able to figure out that the fences were electrified.

“That’s odd,” she said. “Electrified fences at a resort?”

“Miles of them,” Grant said. “Electrified fences and moats, together. And usually with a road alongside them as well.”

“Just like a zoo,” Ellie said.

They went back to the topographical map and looked closely at the contour lines. The roads ran oddly. The main road ran north-south, right through the central hills of the island, one section of road was cut into the side of a cliff, above a river. And the roads were raised up above ground level, so you could see over the fences.

“You know,” Ellie said, “some of these dimensions are enormous. Look at this. This concrete moat is thirty feet wide. That’s like a military fortification.”

“So are these buildings,” Grant said. He had noticed that each open division had a few buildings, usually located in out-of-the-way corners. But the buildings were all concrete, with thick walls. In side-view elevations they looked like concrete bunkers with small windows. Like the Nazi pillboxes from old war movies.

At that moment, they heard a muffled explosion, and Grant put the papers aside. “Back to work,” he said.

“Fire!”

There was a slight vibration, and then yellow contour lines traced across the computer screen, and Alan Grant had a glimpse of the skeleton, beautifully defined, the long neck arched back. It was an infant velociraptor, and it looked perfect. Grant saw the complete skeleton, traced in bright yellow. It was indeed a young specimen. The outstanding characteristic of Velociraptor – the single-toed claw, which in a full-grown animal was a curved, six-inch-long weapon capable to rip open its prey, was in this infant no larger than the thorn on a rosebush. It was hardly visible at all on the screen. And Velociraptor was a lightly built dinosaur in any case, an animal as fine-boned as a bird, and presumably as intelligent.

“Doesn’t look very fearsome,” one of the technicians said.

“He wasn’t,” Grant said. “At least, not until he grew up.” Probably this baby had scavenged, feeding off carcasses killed by the adults, after the big animals had gorged themselves, and lay basking in the sun. Carnivores could eat as much as 25 percent of their body weight in a single meal, and it made them sleepy afterward. The babies would chitter and scramble over the bodies of the adults, and nip little bites from the dead animal. The babies were probably cute little animals.

But an adult velociraptor was another matter entirely. Pound for pound, a velociraptor was the most rapacious dinosaur that ever lived. Although relatively small – about two hundred pounds, the size of a leopard – velociraptors were quick, intelligent, and vicious, able to attack with sharp jaws, powerful clawed forearms, and the devastating single claw on the foot.

Velociraptors hunted in packs, and Grant thought it must have been a sight to see a dozen of these animals racing at full speed, leaping onto the back of a much larger dinosaur, tearing at the neck and slashing at the ribs and belly.

“How did the baby die?” one of the workers asked.

“I doubt we’ll know,” Grant replied. “Infant mortality in the wild is high. In African parks, it runs seventy percent among some carnivores. It could have been anything – disease, separation from the group, anything. Or even attack by an adult. We know these animals hunted in packs, but we don’t know anything about their social behavior in a group.”

The students nodded. They had all studied animal behavior, and they knew, for example, that when a new male took over a lion pride, the first thing he did was kill all the cubs. The reason was genetic: the male had evolved to disseminate his genes as widely as possible, and by killing the cubs he brought all the females into heat, so that he could impregnate them. It also prevented the females from wasting their time nurturing the offspring of another male.

Perhaps the velociraptor hunting pack was also ruled by a dominant male. They knew so little about dinosaurs, Grant thought. After 150 years of research and excavation all around the world, they still knew almost nothing about what the dinosaurs had really been like.

“We’ve got to go,” Ellie said, “if we’re going to get to Choteau by five.”

Hammond

Gennaro’s secretary ran in with a new suitcase. It still had the sales tags on it. “You know, Mr. Gennaro,” she said severely, “when you forget to pack it makes me think you don’t really want to go on this trip.”

“Maybe you’re right,” Gennaro said. “I’m missing my kid’s birthday.”

“Well, I did the best I could on short notice,” his secretary said. “There’s running shoes your size, and khaki shorts and shirts, and a shaving kit. A pair of jeans and a sweatshirt if it gets cold. The car is downstairs to take you to the airport. You have to leave now to make the flight.”

She left. Gennaro walked down the hallway, tearing the sales tags off the suitcase. As he passed the all-glass conference room, Dan Ross left the table and came outside.

“Have a good trip,” Ross said. “But let’s be very clear about one thing. I don’t know how bad this situation actually is, Donald. But if there’s a problem on that island, burn it to the ground.”

“Jesus, Dan… We’re talking about a big investment.”

“Don’t hesitate. Don’t think about it. Just do it. Hear me?”

Gennaro nodded. “I hear you,” he said. “But Hammond – ”

“Screw Hammond,” Ross said.

“My boy, my boy,” the familiar raspy voice said. “How have you been, my boy?”

“Very well, sir,” Gennaro replied. He leaned back in the padded leather chair of the Gulfstream II jet as it flew east, toward the Rocky Mountains.

“You never call me any more,” Hammond said reproachfully. “I’ve missed you, Donald. How is your lovely wife?”

“She’s fine. Elizabeth’s fine. We have a little girl now.”

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Notes

1

coatimundis – коати (лат. Nasua narica) – млекопитающее из рода носух семейства енотовых. Название «коати» происходит из местных индейских языков. Распространена в Белизе, Колумбии (залив Ураба), Коста-Рике, Сальвадоре, Гватемале, Гондурасе, Мексике, Никарагуа, Панаме, США.

2

basilisk lizard – василиски или базилиски (лат. Basiliscus) – род ящериц из семейства Corytophanidae. Насчитывают четыре вида, распространённых в тропической Америке, в частности в Гвиане, Коста-Рике и Панаме.

3

hadrosaur – гадрозавр – динозавр из семейства так называемых «утконосых динозавров». Время обитания – меловой период. Для семейства гадрозавров характерен гребень различных форм. В этом гребне находились носовые полости, которые, вероятно, служили для издавания громких звуков. Гадрозавры имели плоский беззубый, схожий с утиным, клюв, а в задней части челюсти находилось множество плоских зубов. Передвигались как на двух, так и на четырёх конечностях. Имели длинные задние и более короткие передние лапы. Длинный плоский хвост служил для равновесия. Гадрозавры вели стадный образ жизни, строили гнёзда, охраняли кладку и вместе заботились о потомстве.

4

velociraptor – велоцираптор (лат. Velociraptor от лат. velox – «быстрый», rapter – «охотник») – род хищных двуногих динозавров из семейства дромеозаврид. Содержит один общепризнанный вид – Velociraptor mongoliensis. Жил в конце мелового периода 83–70 млн лет назад. Его останки обнаружены в республике Монголия и китайской Внутренней Монголии. Был меньше других представителей своего семейства – дейнониха и ахилло- батора – и обладал рядом прогрессивных анатомических черт. Велоцираптор был небольшим динозавром, до 1,8 м в длину, 60–70 см в высоту и весил – 20 кг.

5

tyrannosaur – тираннозавр (лат. Tyrannosaurus) – род плотоядных динозавров из группы целурозавров, подотряда теропод. Вид Tyrannosaurus rex (лат. rex – «царь»), название которого сокращается по общепринятым правилам как T.rex, проживал на территории североамериканского материка, точнее, в той части, которая в те времена была островным континентом под названием Ларамидия примерно 67–65,5 млн лет назад. Тираннозавр реке был одним из самых крупных наземных хищников; самый большой из всех полных скелетов в длину достигает 12,3 метра, а в высоту – 4 метра до бедра.

6

dromaeosaurus – дромеозавр (лат. Dromaeosaurus) – род хищных ящеротазовых динозавров семейства дромеозавридов, живших в конце мелового периода (76,5—74,8 млн лет назад) в западной и северной части Соединённых Штатов Америки и в Канаде.

7

oviraptor – овираптор – род ящеротазовых динозавров подотряда тероподов, живших в меловом периоде в Монголии. В высоту достигал до 2 метров, весил около 400 кг. Имел длинные ноги и передние лапы. На морде имел небольшой рог.

8

coelurus – целюр (лат. Coelurus – «полый хвост») – род динозавров из средне-позднего киммериджского яруса юрского периода.

9

triassicus – Триамсовый перимод (триамс) – первый геологический период мезозойской эры. Следует за пермским периодом и предшествует юрскому. Начался 250 млн лет назад, кончился 200 млн лет назад. Продолжался, таким образом, около 51 млн лет. Автор имеет в виду, что на снимке не современное животное, а ящер Триасского периода.

10

procompsognathus – прокомпсогнат – это динозавр семейства компсогнатид (Compsognathidae). Был обнаружен в Германии. Питался насекомыми и мелкими млекопитающими. Длина – 1,2 метра. Рост – 30 сантиметров. Вес – 1–2,5 кг. Значение названия: появившийся раньше изящной челюсти. Предполагается, что это предок компсогната – изящной челюсти.

11

coelacanth – целакант. Целакантообразные (лат. Coelacanthiformes) – отряд лопастепёрых рыб. Этот отряд известен по многочисленным ископаемым представителям и единственному современному роду Латимерия (Latimeria). До открытия латимерии в 1938 году целакантообразные считались полностью вымершими.